By Morgan Chilson

TOPEKA — A state audit found that as much as $1.2 million in food assistance payments could have been made to people living outside Kansas, although that would account for less than 1% of state spending on the program.

An audit of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program usage, conducted by the Legislative Post Audit Department, found that between $700,000 and $1.2 million in federal fiscal years 2023 and 2024 may have been paid to recipients living outside Kansas.

However, due to federal regulations, the Kansas Department for Children and Families can’t ask SNAP recipients to notify them within 10 days if they change their address, the report said.

“Because SNAP recipients are not required to report a change of address immediately, DCF can do little to proactively intervene,” the audit said. “DCF officials told us they monitor for unusual transactions and can talk with recipients if they see unusual patterns.”

DCF said in a response that it actively monitors for patterns indicating someone is regularly purchasing items out of state on their electronic benefit, or EBT, card. They require recipients to report change of address and, since October 2025, proof of address at every six-month certification.

LPA staff said that unless a recipient knowingly misreports his or her address at the six-month certification, there are few steps DCF can take to recoup benefits that were paid while the recipient lived out of state.

In the audit, LPA staff looked at 43 million transactions totaling about $1 billion during that time period. To determine possible out-of-state fraud, the agency audited a random sample of 10,500 EBT cards out of nearly 290,000, excluding recipients who lived near state’ borders to eliminate people who shop across the border regularly.

They found 51 SNAP recipients possibly lived in a different state while receiving benefits totaling about $63,000.

“On average, recipients received Kansas SNAP benefits for four months after they appeared to move,” the LPA report said.

The longest a person appeared to receive benefits after appearing to move was 21 months, and the average benefits received were $650, while a single recipient received $5,700, the audit said.

Extrapolating from the data, the LPA report estimated that 1,000 to 1,800 SNAP recipients could have received benefits despite living outside Kansas, which would total between $700,000 and $1.2 million in benefits.

Speaker of the House Dan Hawkins, a Republican candidate for state insurance commissioner, sent out a news release Friday calling the issue a product of Gov. Laura Kelly’s “cover up.”

“A new audit showed what we suspected,” he said. “Is this what the Kelly Cover-Up was hiding? Kansans deserve better stewardship of their tax dollars, and House Republicans took decisive action to stop exactly this kind of misuse.”

Hawkins referred to the passage and veto override of House Bill 2004, which forces DCF and the governor to turn over requested data relating to cash assistance, child care assistance and food assistance when requested by federal agencies.

The bill came about after Kelly and Department for Family and Children Secretary Laura Howard refused to share SNAP data with the U.S. Department of Agriculture until the federal agency agreed that the data wouldn’t be shared with foreign entities. Such a use, which was included in the first data request, would violate Kansas restrictions.

In a response to the report, DCF said that it is legal to use SNAP’s electronic benefits transfer card outside the state at authorized retailers.

Kansas participates in a national program that checks whether beneficiaries are already receiving benefits in other states. The state also launched the National Accuracy Clearinghouse in February 2026, the DCF response said.

“The NAC is a new nationwide system checked at application, recertification, and when household members change in order to prevent duplicate participation,” the response said.

The post audit reported that it may have underestimated potential fraud because it eliminated border states and used a narrow time frame.

It said DCF reported that Kansas is a simplified reporting state, one of two options offered by the federal government, which keeps the costs low but limits the information SNAP recipients are required to report and gives the agency less insight into recipients’ circumstances.

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By Morgan Chilson

TOPEKA — Gov. Laura Kelly vetoed legislation that would have created a sports tourism grant program focused on expanding state investment in sporting events.

Kelly on Monday vetoed House Bill 2346, saying the state already has a fund devoted to drawing sports-related activities, referring to the Attracting Professional Sports to Kansas Fund, which is being used along with Sales Tax and Revenue bonds to fund the public investment in the new Kansas City Chiefs stadium.

“If the Legislature wants to direct a portion of those funds to local communities for sports attraction they should do so,” she said.

HB 2346 would have established the new grant program at the Kansas Department of Commerce to provide dollar-for-dollar matching grants to support sports tourism events.

On Monday, Kelly also allowed House Bill 2018 to become law without her signature. The bill makes it a crime to interfere in a religious assembly and creates a right of civil action if an offense occurs.

“This bill is born out of a tension between two fundamental rights: the right to freely practice religion and the right to freedom of expression,” Kelly said in a news release. “This type of tension is not uncommon in a democracy that has enumerated as many constitutional rights as we enjoy and seek to protect today.”

Kelly said she’s concerned the new law prioritizes one of those rights over the other and “will result in costly litigation.”

In addition to creating misdemeanor and felony charges for disruption of religious services, the bill enables state courts to impose fines against violators ranging from $10,000 to $25,000 for each infraction. It also granted individuals an opportunity to file lawsuits in state court if injured during intrusions of religious activity.

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By Morgan Chilson

TOPEKA — Kansas public school students raising their voices in protest during school hours will need parental permission to leave school grounds to attend a rally or protest event after legislative action Friday.

The House and Senate overrode Gov. Laura Kelly’s line-item veto in the budget bill to enact a proviso that will punish youth for skipping school to attend a protest.

In early March, both chambers passed legislation to clamp down on public school protests by requiring students to receive parental permission before participating and hitting school districts with penalties as high as $100,000 per day if they’re complicit in organizing or encouraging the events or if they don’t enforce restrictions. Fines would go to the state general fund.

In addition, students must make up an instructional day if they walk out for a protest.

Sen. Silas Miller, D-Wichita, said he had concerns that people who didn’t agree with the reason for the protest might file complaints, which could result in bounty-like situations in which schools are fined.

“The next thing you know, there’s a bunch of money being spent on investigations and people getting in trouble, even if the students did get their parental consent,” he said.

Many legislators spoke about freedom of speech rights and the importance of protest in the United States’ history.

Both Kelly in her veto and Democratic lawmakers on the House floor noted it was ironic that Republicans uniformly supported a bill honoring slain activist Charlie Kirk and students’ rights to free speech, then penalized school districts and students if they exercise those rights.

Sen. Pat Pettey, D-Kansas City, said the legislature was giving mixed signals in its treatment.

“We, on one hand, are passing legislation to protect the freedom of our students, whether at the university level and our public schools, and on the other hand, saying, ‘But no, we don’t like the way you’re talking right now or how you’re behaving right now, so we’re going to do just the opposite,’” she said.

Sen. Cindy Holscher, an Overland Park Democrat who is running for governor, said a student called to ask her if this bill would have been introduced if students had walked out to protest Kirk’s death. Instead, several school walk-outs protested Immigrations and Customs Enforcement activities.

“I hope people ponder that question. Who are we protecting free speech for and who are we penalizing?” she said. “Free speech rights do not end at the schoolhouse door.”

Rep. Rui Xu, a Westwood Democrat, spoke directly to any students who might be listening.

“They want you to just sit down and be quiet,” he said. “You are not troublemakers. Like our forefathers, you are being engaged citizens. The moment that the government starts writing laws that silence the youngest voices is the moment that your voices become the most important ones in the room.”

Proponents agreed that Kansas students have the right to free speech, but said they need to express themselves outside school hours.

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By Morgan Chilson

TOPEKA — Republican legislators overrode Gov. Laura Kelly’s veto to create a 25-foot buffer around law enforcement and emergency personnel, a move the Senate leader said ensures Kansas won’t become like Minnesota.

Senate President Ty Masterson said in a news release that House Bill 2372, referred to as the Halo Act, keeps “radical protesters” from interfering with law enforcement and keeps officers and bystanders safe.

Masterson referred to riots in Minnesota when U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers injured and killed bystanders while detaining immigrants.

The bill makes it a misdemeanor crime to go within 25 feet of a first responder while they are working. A violation can result in a fine up to $1,000 and jail term of up to six months.

In addition, the bill outlines regulations for Kansas law enforcement to work with ICE, including allowing sheriffs to detain individuals on an immigration detainer request and to sign ICE contracts without seeking approval from county commissioners. It also requires municipal insurance pools to cover law enforcement officers when they are enforcing federal law.

Establishing a 25-foot boundary around law enforcement is government overreach, said Emily Bradbury, executive director of the Kansas Press Association. In an email to members, she said laws already exist to prevent people from interfering with law enforcement.

It is likely the law is unconstitutional and will cost the state when it goes to court, Bradbury said.

“In Kansas, we have no instances, in recent memory, of journalists interfering with law enforcement but we do have a recent instance of law enforcement interfering with freedom of the press,” she said. “We have to avoid another incident and costly lawsuit.”

Rep. Heather Meyer, an Overland Park Democrat, argued the bill harms community trust in law enforcement and expands the right to hold people indefinitely without judicial warrants.

“This had previously been 48 hours. Now that protection is lost,” she said. “It could occur that an individual could be detained by local law enforcement and then be detained indefinitely, waiting for ICE.”

Meyer also said the bill removes local control, which she called a “hot button” issue this session, by allowing law enforcement to bypass the county commission in deciding whether to sign a contract with ICE.

Rep. Susan Ruiz, D-Shawnee, said some local law enforcement agencies have had contracts, called 287(g) contracts, with ICE or Homeland Security for several years. Currently, according to the ICE website, 28 Kansas sheriff offices and police departments have signed 287(g) contracts.

“What is different now is the fact that Homeland Security has been faced with thousands of lawsuits — 20,000, up to today, federal lawsuits have been filed on behalf of immigrant detainees,” she said.

Court decisions nationwide have found that ICE and law enforcement detained immigrants unlawfully about 4,400 times, Reuters reported.

Ruiz said millions of federal dollars have been paid to settle lawsuits, and Homeland Security has said they won’t financially back sheriff’s departments if they are sued.

“Counties have not had to pay for that,” she said. “Homeland Security now sees that this is adding up for them. So they informed the sheriff’s departments that they’re no longer going to financially back them up.”

The American Civil Liberties Union of Kansas in 2017 analyzed the legal liability of local law enforcement when they operate under the 287(g) contracts for ICE. Because they are free to disregard detainers, those agreements have not been found in court decisions to be a defense for unlawful detention, the ACLU said, listing lawsuits.

“Jailers cannot evade responsibility for unlawful detention by claiming the federal government required them to hold the person on an immigration detainer,” ACLU’s report said.

Rep. Tom Kessler, a Wichita Republican who carried the bill on the House floor, said the bill wasn’t about ICE.

“This bill is about protecting our law enforcement officers and our first responders,” he said. “That’s what this bill is designed for. If one of our law enforcement officers gets hurt, or anything else while they’re enforcing federal law, there’s a possibility that they’re not going to be covered under our insurance pools.”

The House overrode the veto 85-38 and the Senate 31-9, with votes along party lines.

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The Artemis II astronauts said they hope one day some artifact from their mission will be part of the Cosmosphere space museum in Hutchinson.

U.S. Sen. Jerry Moran (R-Kan.) joined a live call Thursday with NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover and Christina Koch, and CSA (Canadian Space Agency) astronaut Jeremy Hansen.

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TOPEKA — House and Senate Republicans overrode Gov. Laura Kelly’s veto Thursday to preserve a bill they say will protect free speech in the name of slain activist Charlie Kirk.

Both chambers voted by a two-thirds majority to put House Bill 2333, or the Kansas Intellectual Rights and Knowledge Act, into law. The bill addresses free speech on college campuses and honors Kirk, a political activist killed by a gunman in September while speaking at a college event.

The bill defines outdoor areas of campuses as public forums and allows the attorney general or aggrieved individuals to seek damages in court. Opponents said the bill was actually written to allow student associations to exclude members based on political, ideological or religious beliefs.

Kelly said the bill would cause confusion for courts and schools.

“I have long believed that the quality of public debate in our nation has been declining, and I strongly support the toning down of political rhetoric and a return to civility,” Kelly said. “Schools and college campuses are excellent places to begin this process. However, free speech and civil discussion are already protected by our state and federal constitutions.”

Rep. Susan Estes, R-Wichita, who carried the bill in the House, said it is necessary to protect both free speech and students.

“This bill sets up neutral policies that get applied to everybody, whether you agree with them or not, to be able to speak safely, a place for counter-protesting safely,” she said. “If we can’t share our difference of opinions respectfully, then I cry for our country.”

Republicans called out Rep. Ford Carr, a Wichita Democrat, for impugning the motives of House members during debate on the bill. Carr challenged legislators to consider the size of their testicles in determining whether they had the guts to vote to sustain the governor’s veto.

He said he has been told that he must have “testicles the size of bowling balls” to stand up the way he does in the House.

“I represent my district. I represent those people that put me here, and I would suffice to say that if you do the same for those people that you represent, I don’t hold the only pair of bowling balls in the room,” Carr said.

“Many of you do have a conscience, albeit difficult sometimes,” he said, which was when he was called to task for impugning motives.

“I’m certainly not doing anything different than anyone else does when they’re addressing the body and they’re speaking from the heart and those things that affect them and their constituency,” Carr said after being told to talk only about the bill. “If there is an issue with someone not wanting to represent their constituency, then I would suggest, possibly, that that individual find new employment.”

Rep. Jerry Stogsdill, a Prairie Village Democrat, said the Legislature was overreaching and interfering with the rights of the Kansas Board of Regents.

Acknowledging how horrible Kirk’s death was, Stogsdill said he nevertheless doesn’t support honoring Kirk.

“He was exercising his free speech, which I totally agree with,” Stogsdill said. “But when you use your free speech to promote hate and bigotry and misogyny and racism, that is something that this body should not honor and encourage.”

Rep. Kirk Haskins, D-Topeka, raised concerns that the bill treats political organizations and political ideologies in the way that religious freedoms are protected.

“Now Republican organizations, Democrat organizations, Libertarian organizations, will have the same protection as religion, and that is a violation of the Bill of Rights,” Haskins said.

The House overrode the veto on an 85-38 vote.

There was no debate on the bill in the Senate, which overrode the veto on a 29-11 vote.

In a release about Kelly’s veto of the bill, House Speaker Dan Hawkins said college campuses are a place where speech should be protected and not shut down.

“The KIRK Act ensures that taxpayer-funded institutions do not pick and choose which voices are allowed and which are silenced,” he said.

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By Anna Kaminski

TOPEKA — The agreement between the Kansas City Chiefs and the state of Kansas to build a new $3 billion domed football stadium, headquarters, training facility and entertainment district could be the largest stadium deal in American history, and most Kansas lawmakers agreed last week to establish a sports authority board to oversee the project.

The unparalleled public subsidies that accompany the deal have drawn criticism from economists, politicians and football fans from the jump.

Sen. Mike Thompson, R-Shawnee, said the deal will live in infamy and become a euphemism for disagreeable legislation of the future.

On Friday, lawmakers passed the Kansas Sports Facilities Authority Act, establishing an 11-member board to oversee the project. It will have the power to develop and control new facilities, acquire and dispose of property, contract for services and employees, sue and be sued, and procure industry standard insurance. The bill was fast-tracked through the Legislature in March and still requires the governor’s approval to become law.

In a 60-40 split, the state will cover at least $1.8 billion of the project cost through sales tax and revenue bonds, or STAR bonds, and funds siphoned from iLottery and sports wagering revenues. The project, which was announced in December, also includes a $1 billion entertainment district and a new training facility and team headquarters in Olathe.

The Hunt family, which owns the Chiefs, pledged $1 billion to the project, and other private funds will cover the private sector’s remaining 40% obligation.

Under the act, authority members will include the Kansas secretary of commerce, who is currently Lt. Gov. David Toland, and people appointed by the Chiefs, the governor, the mayors of Olathe and the Unified Government of Wyandotte County, and the majority and minority leaders in both chambers.

Appointees must be Kansas residents with education, training and experience relevant to facility administration, accounting, law, marketing or other fields. The mayors are able to appoint themselves as voting members, and all members must be appointed by Aug. 31. Once formed, the authority can hire an executive director, who won’t be compensated with state funds but from the $7 million in annual rent the Chiefs will be obligated to pay for use of the stadium.

Rep. Rui Xu, D-Westwood, said the Kansas Sports Facilities Authority would be the first in the nation to include a voting member from the team. He cited that as his reason for voting against the formation of the sports authority. He said it was ridiculous the state was allowing the team to oversee its own agreements.

The Jackson County Sports Complex Authority, which oversees the Kansas City Royals’ Kauffman Stadium and the Chiefs’ current home at Arrowhead Stadium, has a five-member board of private professionals. Both stadiums were built more than 50 years ago, and the Chiefs’ move came after years of negotiations with Kansas and Missouri that escalated to a border war.

Missouri voters rejected a ballot question in 2024 that would have provided the team with hundreds of millions of dollars in public investment to renovate Arrowhead.

Rep. Paul Waggoner, R-Hutchinson, also voted against the sports authority act, questioning whether the state-issued STAR bonds would be paid for by business from the new stadium within a defined district. He speculated inflation will pay for the bonds instead.

“When you have a stadium, and you are somehow trying to pretend that economic activity five miles away in a metropolitan area is somehow generated because of what you did with a stadium, I mean, you’re obviously not being serious,” Waggoner said Friday on the House floor. “You’re obviously not looking at the real economics of it.”

He argued the deal will have an overall negative impact on the state budget if sales tax revenues flatten in a growing part of the state.

Rep. Sean Tarwater, R-Stilwell, chair of the House Commerce Committee and a staunch proponent of the deal, presented the act on the House floor, bitterly criticizing colleagues at one point for opposing the legisaltion. He spent several minutes praising the Hunt family for its philanthropic endeavors and economic prowess.

“I just wanted to take a moment to look at all the great things that that family does since they seem to be getting trashed up here,” Tarwater said.

Rep. John Carmichael, D-Wichita, called for a point of order, challenging Tarwater’s statement. Carmichael, who voted against the bill, complained that Tarwater’s remarks were laudatory statements about the Hunt family rather than on the subject of the bill.

“Well thank God he came up here,” Tarwater said, “because I could talk for three or four hours about all the fantastic things that family does.”

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By Anna Kaminski

TOPEKA — Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly vetoed a partisan, anti-abortion bill that offered protections to crisis pregnancy centers, which can function as alternatives to health clinics with abortion services.

Within hours, the House and Senate voted to overturn her decision.

Kelly said Kansans have been clear. They don’t want the government involved in private medical decisions, she said in a Friday announcement.

“That means we shouldn’t be spending tax dollars trying to interfere with that very personal, very private, medical decision,” she said. “That’s why I’m vetoing this bill.”

The House voted 87-35 and the Senate voted 30-9 to override the veto.

House Bill 2635 exempted centers from regulations that dictate what information, services and resources centers can provide on pregnancy, childbirth and parenting. Centers, sometimes called pregnancy resource centers, typically don’t provide abortions and, instead, dispense inaccurate information about abortion pill reversal treatment, undercut regulatory oversight and target low-income populations, according to the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.

Kansans for Life, the organization that proposed the bill, said in a statement posted on X that Kelly’s veto was “sad, but not surprising.”

Rep. Tom Kessler, R-Wichita, criticized Kelly’s justification for the veto that the bill was a waste of taxpayer dollars. The bill didn’t include a direct fiscal impact estimate, he said.

Rep. Heather Meyer, D-Overland Park, said that taxpayer dollars are involved because legislators stood on the House floor Friday evening discussing pregnancy resource centers “when the majority of Kansans already stated that they support a person’s right to choose their own reproductive decisions.”

Through separate legislation and budget provisions, the Legislature has given $7 million to crisis pregnancy centers since 2022 through a state program.

The pregnancy center autonomy and rights of expression act, or CARE Act, also makes it easier for centers to file lawsuits against any individual or governing entity that violates the CARE Act, if it were to become law. The bill allows state legislators to intervene in any CARE Act lawsuit. The Office of Judicial Administration said the bill could increase caseloads in district courts because it creates a new private cause of action, potentially affecting judicial budgets.

Other Democrats, including Wichita Rep. Ford Carr and Lawrence Rep. Brooklynne Mosley, questioned the true motives behind legislators’ pro-life ideology, arguing they fail to support children after birth.

House Speaker Dan Hawkins, R-Wichita, condemned Kelly’s veto ahead of the override vote.

“This governor is quick to talk about supporting choice, but that support disappears the moment a mother chooses life,” he said in a statement.

He said politicians and bureaucrats shouldn’t interfere with organizations that run pregnancy resource centers, and to target those groups “is just plain wrong.”

Senate President Ty Masterson, R-Andover, said Kelly vetoed “good legislation that saves lives.”

“This bill simply protects pregnancy resource centers’ ability to educate mothers and provide life-affirming care,” he said in a statement.

Earlier that day, Masterson celebrated the House vote that overrode Kelly’s veto of tax breaks for nontraditional health plan users by ringing a bell outside the House chamber.

“I look forward to ringing-in another override soon,” he said before the second override vote.

This story has been updated to reflect the Legislature’s veto override votes.

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